Sakshi expelled from national camp, taken back after apology

New Delhi: Olympic medallist Sakshi Malik was expelled from the national camp by the Wrestling Federation India (WFI) for leaving the training centre in Lucknow without permission but was later allowed to rejoin after she replied to the show cause issued to her.

In a shocking turn of events, 25 out of of the 45 women grapplers, who train at the SAI centre in Lucknow, reported absent from the national camp without taking permission from the National Federation.

Out of these 25, three grapplers including Sakshi (62kg), Seema Bisla (50kg) and Kiran (76kg) had recently qualified for the World Championship.

The trio was issued show cause notice and their deadline for submitting reply was Wednesday.

All the 25 wrestlers were expelled and were barred from competing in Monday's World Championship trials in four non-Olympic categories.

According to WFI Assistant Secretary Vinod Tomar, once the Indian squads left for Belarus and Estonia for tournaments, the remaining wrestlers left the camp without seeking permission.

"I am back in Lucknow and have been at camp since yesterday. After returning from the International competition in Belarus, I went home for a couple of days given that trials had been completed and a number of other girls had also gone home.

"I responded immediately to the notice issued by the WFI, which they accepted in full and I returned to camp," Sakshi said.

WFI officials said Sakshi, in her reply, wrote that she had gone home for Raksha Bandhan festival.

"We had asked Sakshi, Seema and Kiran to reply to the show cause notices. Others, we have not even bothered to ask. They have simply been expelled for indiscipline. We will see later if we need to call them back for the camp," Tomar said.